The stock market today sets out amid increased uncertainty, after Monday's session raised the market's distribution day count to seven days each on the Nasdaq and S&P 500.

That sends a strong signal that institutional investors are backing out of positions, and suggests that individual investors be on their guard.

It only took a century, but the Senate confirmed Janet Yellen as the Federal Reserve's first chairwoman in a 56-26 vote Monday. Yellen is slated to take control Feb. 1.

Tuesday was set to be a quiet day on the economic front. The lead report was the Commerce Department's November trade balance data, showing the deficit narrowed to $34.3 billion from October's $40.6 billion gap, better than the consensus target of $39.9 billion.

The International Council of Shopping Centers showed retail sales slumped 5.4% week over week, but were up 1.7% vs. the same week a year ago.

Tech stocks were positive in premarket trade, with Apple (AAPL), Priceline.com (PCLN), Microsoft (MSFT) and Amazon.com (AMZN) all leaning higher ahead of the bell. The group had traded lower in Monday's premarket.

Netflix (NFLX) slumped 4% before the open after Morgan Stanley downgraded shares to underweight from equalweight and trimmed the price target to $310 from $333. The note pointed to rising competition from the likes of Amazon.com, HBO and Hulu.

The stock had been pulling back in light trade from a Dec. 24 high, ending Monday just above its 50-day line of support.

Some smaller drugmakers were posting dramatic moves.

Neurocrone Biosciences (NBIX) bolted 62% higher in premarket action. The San Diego-based drugmaker announced Monday mid-stage trial results that showed one of its experimental drugs worked better than a placebo in reducing the effects of tardive dyskinesia, an illness characterized by involuntary movements and spasms.

Another young drugmaker, Epizyme (EPZM), shot ahead 32% before the bell. The Cambridge, Mass., company met two development milestones, earning it a $25 million payment from partner Celgene (CELG) and a $4 million milestone payment from GlaxoSmithKline (GSK).

The stock had toppled 55% from its July high, but remained 50% above its May IPO price.

The dollar slipped quietly vs. the euro and rose against the yen. Oil prices hung near $94 a barrel. Gold held just below $1,236 an ounce. Spot prices for natural gas spiked in some markets, alongside plummeting temperatures, but futures showed little response, with natural gas up only a fraction to $4.33 per million British thermal units.

See Also

Earnings season has been unkind to a number of recent leaders like Taser International (NASDAQ:TASR), but it has spurred plenty of other stocks to breakouts or big gains. The market uptrend is still under pressure, but these stocks aren't letting that get in their way. The IBD 50 index rose 0.4% ...

The travel-booking industry group was the top performer Friday, and Expedia (NASDAQ:EXPE) was a big part of the reason. It gapped out of a base to an all-time high after an upbeat Q2 report. Priceline (NASDAQ:PCLN) also gapped higher and was trading near a buy point. And Sabre (NASDAQ:SABR) broke ...

Just six companies are keeping second-quarter earnings growth in positive territory for S&P 500 businesses, which may suggest more softness to come. With 72% of S&P 500 companies having reported their performance in the last calendar quarter, earnings have grown a mere 0.9%. Revenue so far ...

Arista Networks (NYSE:ANET) is teaching a quick lesson in flexibility in chart interpretation. The Santa Clara, Calif.-based company provides software and hardware for cloud networking. Its cloud networking gear manages data traffic between Internet users and the data centers of major customers ...

07/31/2015 05:20 PM ET

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